


Ghost of Smoke and Shadows

by Moonlark



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Amnesia, Attempted Murder, Blood, Dark, Kidnapping, M/M, Montana Wildfires, Murderers, PTSD, Sensory Overload
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-12
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-07 03:49:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1884216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonlark/pseuds/Moonlark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>November 2014. Fourteen games into the 2014-15 season, Paul Martin goes missing from the bathroom of a New York bar, leaving behind only a pattern of blood spatters and a tiny scrap of paper with the words "<em>Dúisigh mé má tá tú amach ann</em>" on it— Irish for "Wake me if you're out there."</p><p>July 2015. A fire burning in Montana's Arrowhead Mountains is threatening a livestock and wildlife, not to mention a nearby ranch housing 'troubled' teens over the summer. Crys and Alex, twin sisters, are hoping the fire gets bad enough to send them back to the city. Then a weary, burned, and bedraggled ginger-haired man with no memory of who he was before three months ago walks out of the charred zone and proceeds to make the best scrambled eggs the twins have ever tasted, and the summer that almost wasn't quickly spirals into the summer they wish hadn't been.</p><p>As a killer draws closer and the flames rise in the valley below, it might just be better to leave the past where it lies. Some secrets should not be remembered, and there are those who will do anything to make sure that the "dead" stay buried...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghost of Smoke and Shadows

_On Tuesday, November 11, 2014, just after midnight, various members of the Pittsburgh Penguins were patronizing a bar in New York City, New York. They were drinking and laughing, celebrating a win over the New York Rangers. The mood was light, and spirits were high; the new guys had settled in well, games were being won, and it seemed that things were looking up._

_At approximately 12:15 am, defenseman Paul Martin left the group and entered the bar's bathroom._

He sighs as the door shuts behind him, cutting off the chattering voices outside and leaving him in relative quiet. The noise is still echoing around in his skull, swirling nauseatingly enough that it's hard to see straight. He's barely drunk anything tonight, mainly because when these episodes happen food and drink just make things worse. 

He reaches out with a shaking hand and flips the light switch, relief flooding through him as the room is plunged into darkness. His breathing steadies as he presses the hoodie against his face (if he sniffs, it still carries just a trace of Nealer's scent). It's a while before he stands again and reaches for the light, feeling much more grounded and secure.

In the instant after he switches it on, while his eyes are still adjusting to the brightness, something slams squarely into his stomach. The breath whooshes out of his lungs and he gasps like a fish out of water, stumbling backwards and flailing blindly. The next second, his feet are knocked out from under him and a hand clamps across his mouth, hauling him upright and pressing him back into someone.

"Shh, shhhh," whispers a voice near his ear. It's male, soft and low, with a gentle lilt that does not fit the situation. "It's bad manners to talk over someone else. Oh, and no one's gonna hear you anyway."

Paul ignores the voice and continues to struggle, sinking his teeth into the hand and slamming an elbow back into the stranger's ribcage. There's a pained grunt and the grip loosens for an instant, and he takes the opportunity to slip free and grab the door handle—but it doesn't open, locked. He whirls around in time to see the stranger rising to their feet—a blond man, middle-aged and tall, with cold eyes and long hands that are currently pulling a gun out of a hip holster and leveling it at Paul's head.

He swallows nervously. This is now a whole different situation.

"I thought I told you that kind of stuff was bad manners," the man snarls, still soft and low but without any remaining trace of gentleness. "I don't appreciate the disobedience."

"It's bad manners to attack someone in a bathroom. I don't appreciate that," Paul retorts, eyes fixed on the gun as he tries to keep his voice from shaking.

The man smirks. "Yes, well here's the difference between the two: I've got a means of enforcing my words, whereas you just have empty breath." He waves the gun around, and it's all that Paul can do not to flinch. "So what you're gonna do is turn around and put your hands behind your back, and keep quiet, if you don't want some lead in your cranium."

Paul hesitates, weighing his options. If he doesn't go along with this, then he's got no doubt that the guy will shoot, but if he obeys, then... well, he heard somewhere that if you're assaulted, the worst thing you can do is to let the assailant take you to a second location, because then your chances of survival plummet. So... either choice seems pretty bad right now.

The man clears his throat, and then, in a singsong voice, says, "Too slow, sir." The gun comes up to point sat him again.

"Umm..." Paul says, trying desperately to think of a way out of this, because there's got to be a way out—

_UUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNHHH._

He's not even sure where the pain's coming from; it seems like all over, a mindless tsunami of torture. Eventually, he becomes somewhat aware again; his cheek is pressed against the cool tiles, his hands are being bound behind his back, and there's a sharp, jagged agonizing hole in his shoulder as his blood seeps across the floor.

"Wha—why?" he manages to groan out. The guy bends down behind him and whispers in his ear, voice gentle and lilting again, "Because I can."

Then comes the laughter, strangely shrill and echoing in the empty bathroom. It's still going on when something crashes into the base of Paul's skull. A starburst of pain explodes, and everything goes black.

 

_At approximately 1:35 am, the Penguins players remaining in the bar began getting ready to leave, due to the efforts of one Sidney Crosby to make sure that no one ever had any fun. Winger Beau Bennett drew to short straw to go find Martin and tell him that it was time to go. No one really wanted to interrupt Martin during one of the episodes, but they figured that an hour and twenty minutes was probably enough time._

The hallway leading to the bathroom is dark, somewhat musty, and a completely different experience than the rest of the bar. Beau stumbles slightly as he attempts to avoid the girl who seems to be sleeping on the floor and decides that when he's done with this little errand, he'll tell the bartender about her—make sure no one takes advantage. 

But he's got something else to do first.  

The bathroom door creaks when he pushes it open, a long, drawn-out screech. The bathroom is dark, and there's almost no light from the hallway to help Beau's eyes.

"Paulie?" he calls out, fumbling for a light switch. "We're getting ready to head out..."

His hand encounters a patch of wetness on the wall, and something in his stomach twists. Whatever that wetness is, this is not how he'd wanted to end the night. 

There's a distinct sense of relief when he finally finds the plastic of the light switch. He flicks it on, gets one look at his hand, whirls to stare at the rest of the bathroom, and screams.

Hours later, sitting on a curb just outside the caution tape, with Geno's arm around his shoulders and Borts' hand on his knee, Beau's still trying to keep from breaking down. Even though the carmine streaks are long gone, he scrubs his hands together, because at least Lady Macbeth had that shit right.

He can't get the image of crimson splashes drying on clean white tile out of his mind, or the scrap of paper weighted to the floor with a jagged pebble—he hadn't gotten close enough to see it, doesn't want to have seen it—he knows he's going to have nightmares about this already. And the blood...

Beau shudders and scrubs his hands together harder, but the shade of a scarlet smear refuses to fade from his sight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If not for the gun, Paulie would've won the fight in the bathroom.


End file.
